Having a celebration

"Celebration is important, as most people do not realise how hard being a parent is before they become one," says Colin Bridle, Tokoroa's Salvation Army community ministries manager.

Colin has been running parenting courses for more than four years, teaching up to 90 parents each year. They try to make it fun and celebration is an important part of that.

"Celebrating parents' successes builds self-esteem and confidence, and reinforces what parents have learnt during the courses.

"Every parent gets a certificate to acknowledge they have completed the course. We also play 'It's In the Bag' with prizes donated by local businesses. Contestants answer three parenting questions and pick a bag.

"Parents say how much fun it is, but you also realise that for many it may be the first time they have ever received a certificate or won anything. They feel really proud. You can see their chests puff out. This really does build self-esteem and confidence."

That taste of success can prove a turning point: "One mother went on to complete a social work course because she enjoyed the parenting course so much," recalls Colin.

Family fun days are also held regularly to celebrate all local families. The summer swimming pool fun day attracts hundreds of families and is an important way of promoting parenting courses.

"We have about 30 per cent uptake of men on our courses because we emphasise that parenting is fun.

"Fun days are really useful because we can observe family dynamics before the programmes and then see how effective courses have been when we see them again at the mid-winter christmas party," says Colin.

"Celebration is an important part of the process. It's far easier to say you've done well than to knock people down. It's having an 'attitude of gratitude'."